In the six months since launch, more than 80,000 people have registered on the Birzhevoy Broker (Stock Broker) platform and through partner platforms, and shares in American companies can now be purchased directly from a mobile operator’s app.
In October, the company became a placement partner for Alif Uzbekistan sukuk — Islamic bonds denominated in dollars and available to investors from Tajikistan. Birzhevoy Broker Director-GeneralAbduvoris Qalandarov spoke about who is investing in the country today, how to tell a licensed broker from fraudsters, and why the Islamic finance market in the region is only just getting started.
A market that didn’t exist
Q. Abduvoris, it is generally assumed that people in Tajikistan keep their savings in dollars at home or invest in property. Why does the country need a retail broker?
A. Precisely because that is the case. Money kept at home does not work and loses value over time. Property is a good asset, but it is not accessible to everyone and requires a large sum upfront. Until recently, a person in Tajikistan simply had no straightforward, regulated way to invest a hundred dollars in shares or bonds.
The only options were to look for a foreign broker or to trust obscure platforms from social media. We have made that option available from a phone — in the Birzhevoy Broker app and under a Tajik license.
Q. If we put that into figures: how many clients do you have and how quickly are you growing?
A. In the six months since launch, more than 80,000 people have registered on our platform and through partner platforms. What matters more to us is something else: for the majority of them, this is their first encounter with the securities market. That means we are not dividing up an existing market — we are creating a new one.
Q. Who is your typical client?
A. Roughly two thirds are residents of Tajikistan, and one third are our citizens working abroad, mainly in Russia. They are most often people aged 25–45 with a stable income who want their savings to work for them.
Since many are investing for the first time, we invest not only in the product but also in education: we have a magazine and an academy where we explain in plain language how the market works.
A license as a reserve of trust
Q. Social media is full of offers to “make money on the stock exchange”, and quite a few people have been burnt by them. What makes you different?
A. We hold four licenses from the Ministry of Finance: a brokerage license, a dealer license, a securities management license, and a depository license. We have a physical office in Dushanbe that anyone can walk into, and a director who stands behind the company with his name.
We do not offer forex or contracts for difference: clients buy real shares and bonds in companies such as Apple, Google, or Tesla. And we never promise returns. If someone guarantees you a fixed percentage per month, that is the first sign that you are better off walking away.
Q. Where are a client’s securities physically held? And what happens to them if something goes wrong with the broker?
A. Clients’ securities are not kept “in our safe” — they are held at major international custodian institutions. Birzhevoy Broker was the first Tajikistani company to open accounts at the Central Securities Depository of Kazakhstan and at the ITS exchange.
Clients’ securities are recorded in separate client accounts, kept apart from the broker’s own assets. This means that even if something happens to the broker, the securities will not become its property and will remain the clients’ own. That is the reserve of trust that a client does not see while everything is going well. A license and reliable infrastructure are not needed for advertising — they are needed precisely for the moment when something goes wrong.
Q. Tell us about yourself. Where did you start?
A. I have been working in the capital markets for 15 years. In 2019, I founded Yediny Broker in Tatarstan — the first private brokerage firm in the republic, holding four licenses. Today it is part of an international bank’s structure.
I am also a co-founder of MTG Group, a holding company that builds brokerage infrastructure in Central Asia, the Middle East, and Europe, with offices in Astana, Abu Dhabi (ADGM), and Prague. Alongside that, I am involved in venture investments — I am among the early investors in Coinsbuy, Robinhood, and Kraken. Everything we learned over those years has been brought into Birzhevoy Broker.
Sukuk: Islamic finance enters the market
Q. In October you began accepting applications for the Alif Uzbekistan sukuk. What kind of instrument is this?
A. Sukuk are Islamic bonds. The key difference from conventional bonds is that the investor receives no interest for the use of money but a share of the profit from a real business. In this issuance, investors’ funds go towards goods that Alif sells to buyers in Uzbekistan on an instalment basis.
The terms are straightforward: one sukuk costs $100, the term is two years, payments are quarterly, and the expected yield is up to 10%–10.5% per annum in dollars. The issuance is secured by collateral at 120% and is listed on the Astana International Exchange (AIX).
Q. Why an Islamic instrument specifically?
A. Because demand for Sharia-compliant investments in Tajikistan is very high, yet there are almost no clear instruments available. Many people do not invest precisely because they do not want to receive interest.
I am myself a certified AAOIFI Sharia adviser and I understand how important it is for such instruments to be genuinely compliant in substance, not just in name. The Alif issuance is structured on the mudaraba model, and the funds operate through murabaha transactions — the purchase and sale of real goods.
Q. What is Birzhevoy Broker’s role in this issuance, and how can one buy sukuk?
A. The arranger of the issuance is the Kazakhstani investment company Teniz Capital; we are the partner broker in Tajikistan and accept applications from local investors. Individuals, companies, banks, and microfinance organizations may all purchase them.
Everything is done online: download the Birzhevoy Broker app from the App Store or Google Play, open an account, fund it in somoni or dollars, and submit an application. The minimum amount is $100. Applications are accepted until 10 November.
Q. What risks does the investor take on?
A. I always speak about this plainly. A yield of up to 10% is an expectation, not a guarantee: it depends on the issuer’s business results. Collateral at 120% reduces the risk but does not eliminate it. Sukuk are not insured like bank deposits, and selling them before maturity is only possible if a buyer can be found on the exchange.
So my advice is simple: invest only money you will not need in the next two years, and do not put everything into a single instrument.
Partnerships instead of branches
Q. Your service is available in the MegaFon Life app. Why does a broker reach clients through a mobile operator?
A. Because everyone has a phone, but few people will walk into a brokerage office. We embed investing where people already pay and transfer money. It is cheaper for the client and faster for the market. We are currently working on integrations with other operators and banks in the country.
Q. The financial market has banks, foreign apps, and fintech. What is your advantage?
A. We are a local regulated broker: clients know where to go and who is accountable. Top-ups in somoni and dollars through familiar services, support in Tajik and Russian. And we are not competing with banks at all — on the contrary, we help them.
We give them new capital market instruments and our technology. Even a large bank would find it unprofitable to launch such a project on its own: it takes several million dollars and years of development. It is simpler and faster to connect to a ready-made infrastructure.
Q. You say you help banks. In what way exactly?
A. Not only with technology. The financial world is small: everyone knows everyone, and reputation counts for a great deal here. Our experience and reputation help Tajikistani banks build relationships quickly with banks in neighboring countries, Asia, and Europe.
In addition, we help banks place their free balances on financial markets more profitably and reliably — through regulated instruments with a clear risk level. When banks are stronger, the country’s entire financial market is stronger too.
Earn abroad — save at home
Q. Hundreds of thousands of Tajikistanis work abroad. What do you offer them?
A. These people already send money home every month. Part of that money need not be spent — it can be invested so that it works for the family. We are a Tajik licensed broker for citizens of Tajikistan, wherever they may be: an account is opened remotely, by passport, without a visit to the office. For many, this is the first step from “saving” to “growing”.
Q. You are preparing another product — a broker card. What is it?
A. It is an online card in US dollars, linked to a brokerage account at Birzhevoy Broker. The idea is simple: money should not sit in different places. The balance on the card is the free funds in the brokerage account: you can spend them like a regular dollar card, or at any moment direct them towards buying securities.
You can top it up via the Faster Payments System and electronic wallets — which is especially convenient for our citizens working in Russia. On balances from $1,000 we accrue 4% per annum in dollars. This is not a bank deposit, and the rate may change.
For the first 10,000 clients the card is issued free of charge. We are currently at the pre-launch stage: you can submit an application in the Birzhevoy Broker app or at broker.tj/bb-card.
Looking ahead
Q. What goal have you set for the company over the coming years?
A. Our goal is 1 million clients by 2028. But the main thing is not even the numbers. I want investing in Tajikistan to become as ordinary as a money transfer or paying a phone bill.
Q. What decision during this time has been the hardest for you?
A. Convincing partners to launch specifically in Tajikistan. Many said the market here was not developing and that we should start with larger countries. We understand: by the standards of the global market, the Tajikistani market is still small. But someone has to lay a solid foundation — for us, for other market participants, and for those who will come after us. Things will move forward from there.
We came in with our sleeves rolled up and within a year launched a licensed broker with access to global exchanges. Not because we are somehow special, but first and foremost thanks to the team’s experience and expertise. We spent more than five years developing our technology and tested it in various countries. There are very few companies in the world that provide such a turnkey brokerage infrastructure — among the well-known ones are the American firms Alpaca and DriveWealth.
For us, this is not just business. When people have the opportunity to honestly preserve and grow their savings, the whole country benefits. That is what we work for.
Q. Looking ten years ahead, what challenges await Tajikistan’s investment market?
A. The first challenge is financial literacy. People need to learn how to invest: understand risk, not believe promises of “guaranteed returns”, think years ahead. One dishonest scheme can put people off the market for years, so education is a shared responsibility of all participants.
The second challenge is the financial market itself, and here we see our main role — to shape it. Foreign investors today are taking a serious look at Central Asia. But to invest in Tajikistan’s enterprises and economy, they need instruments that are familiar on international financial markets: regulated brokers, depositories, and exchange-listed securities.
By building this infrastructure today, we are laying the foundation of a capital market through which foreign money will be able to enter the country. It is no coincidence that in his address to the Majlisi Oli in December 2025, President Emomali Rahmon set the task of expanding the market for government and corporate securities, developing a capital market development strategy, and more actively attracting foreign direct investment. We see ourselves as part of that work.
In ten years’ time I want to see Tajikistanis buying not only American stocks and Uzbek sukuk, but also securities of their own companies — and foreign investors investing in those companies alongside them. Investing begins not with money, but with trust — and that is precisely what we are building.